Love Of Game Earns Lasorda A Spot In Hall

Mike Holtzclaw

August 04, 1997|By MIKE HOLTZCLAW Daily Press

At his Hall of Fame induction ceremony in Cooperstown on Sunday, Tommy Lasorda talked about God and family and the American Dream. All as they related to baseball. He told jokes, recounted anecdotes and dabbed tears from his eyes.

This is what's known as ``dancing with the one who brung you.''

Because, regardless of what it says on his plaque, they put Tommy Lasorda in the Hall not as a manager, but as an after-dinner speaker. His greatest accomplishments did not come in the dugout at Dodger Stadium, but on talk shows and at fan rallies and in children's hospital wards.

As a manager and tactician, he was good, but not great. As an ambassador for the sport, he might be the best there's ever been.

In his 20 years managing the Dodgers, Lasorda won four pennants and two World Series titles, and his players won a stunning nine Rookie of the Year awards. He also spent more than five years trying to make ham-handed Pedro Guerrero a third baseman when it took the rest of us about five games to recognize this was a square peg and a round hole. His decision to pitch to Cardinals slugger Jack Clark in Game 5 of the 1985 National League playoffs - Clark's dramatic home run stole the pennant from L.A. - remains the most second-guessed move in the history of the League Championship Series.

His record is good, but several of his contemporaries were clearly better. Sparky Anderson won more games and more titles. Billy Martin had a more tangible effect on his teams' performance. Whitey Herzog was the greater strategist and was the first person courageous enough to stand up and fight against the sport's burgeoning drug problem in the early 1980s.

The Total Baseball reference book estimates what each team's record should have been, based on the number of runs the team scored and allowed during any given season. According to this admittedly imperfect statistic, Herzog helped his teams win 21.6 games more than expected. Martin's teams came out ahead by 27.5 victories, Anderson's teams by 18.2.

Lasorda's teams won about 20 games fewer than expected.

But when the members of the Veterans Committee convened this past winter to make their Hall of Fame selections, they bypassed all other managerial candidates in order to honor Lasorda just a few months after he retired.

Joe McCarthy, who won seven World Series titles, had to wait seven years after retiring before he was voted into the Hall of Fame. Same waiting period for Lasorda's predecessor, the great Walter Alston. It took a decade for Earl Weaver, and Leo Durocher died before they finally put him in. But when Lasorda retired, he was whisked to the front of the line like Sinatra at an ``A-list'' restaurant.

This speedy induction is testimony to Lasorda's famous gift for schmoozing; the Veterans Committee, notorious for favoring cronies and popular ex-teammates, was an easy mark.

In this instance, maybe it's not such a bad thing.

In an era of unscrupulous owners, mercenary players and a paper doll masquerading as commissioner, Lasorda's sincere gushing about ``bleeding Dodger blue'' comes off as more sweet than hokey. Amid salary disputes, work stoppages and the unforgivable specter of a canceled World Series, Lasorda is better than anyone at speaking directly and passionately to the fans and reminding them why they love this sport as much as he does.

His emotional speech on Sunday probably sold more tickets to more ballgames in more cities than any offseason free agent signing.

Maybe that's why he was inducted in the first place. It might just be that baseball needs him in the Hall of Fame.